Watch The Great Gabbo For Free

A Disappointing Continuation

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

This movie will probably be enjoyable mainly to those of us interested in the early talkie era of films. This movie is an odd combination of a Ziegfeld-like musical revue and a psychological study of a man's descent into madness, and was based on a story by Ben Hecht. It is not your melodrama set to music that you would typically see in 1929.Gabbo (Erich Von Stroheim) is a ventriloquist, apparently living with his girlfriend Mary (Betty Compson) who also helps him in his act. His mannequin, Otto, seems to take on a life of his own. At first you believe that Gabbo is only imagining Otto is talking, but very shortly you see that Otto is moving and talking from several feet away from Gabbo - but always in Gabbo's presence - regardless of whether other people are around or not, and these other people see Otto move and speak too. Everyone just attributes this to Gabbo's talent and eccentricity, nothing else. Gabbo is constantly berating Mary, complaining that his coffee is too hot or too cold, blaming his lack of success on her, and finally daring her to leave, which she does. Time passes, and Gabbo becomes the star of the Manhattan Revue, a successful Ziegfeld-like Broadway production, and a show in which Mary is also starring as a singer and dancer with her partner and boyfriend, Frank (Donald Douglas). Mary begins to make some friendly gestures towards Gabbo, which Gabbo happily interprets as Mary's desire to reunite with him. However, things are not as they appear in more ways than one, and when Mary tells Gabbo a secret she has been keeping he goes completely mad. Gabbo even punches Otto saying it is his fault that Mary has left him.The musical part of the film has some lavish numbers that appear very typical of Ziegfeld's productions, although the famous showman had nothing to do with this movie. Besides the pre-Busby Berkeley dances in which the people in the chorus descend a staircase and then proceed to dance on the stage in a straight line with the camera either focusing on the dancer's feet or costumes but seldom both, there are some rather inventive numbers. One involves the dancers performing with some giant pinwheels raised in the background. Another one has the performers dressed as spiders that first sing while raised on a giant spider web, then some of them climb down and perform the rest of the act on stage. The odd staging and costumes in the musical numbers just add to the surrealistic mood of Gabbo's growing insanity.It seems that since Otto's speech and motion are not figments of Gabbo's imagination, that perhaps Otto's personality is the "human side" of Gabbo. Otto is what Gabbo would be like if he was less self-involved. Mary seems to hint at this several times early in the film when she says that the only kind words Gabbo ever said to her came from Otto. At the end of the film, after Mary makes clear to Gabbo she will never return to him and why, Otto never moves or speaks again. It is as though Otto's lifelessness shows that any remaining humanity in Gabbo has burned out for good. Erich Von Stroheim was particularly good as Gabbo. Being both a director and an actor himself in both the silent and talking era might have helped him in this. If you are interested in obscure early talkies, I'm sure you'll like this movie.

Erich Von Stroheim will always have his champions - there was a great artist in him. When I reviewed the fragments of "Queen Kelly" a few days back, I said that his method is time consuming compared to what a normal film editing/directing job is like, but it does hold one's attention closely. "Queen Kelly" had a melodramatic, impossible script. But "Foolish Wives", "The Merry Widow", and "Greed" had good scripts.After "Queen Kelly" folded Stroheim had to find another job because he had a family to support (a wife and son). He had, originally, been an actor. In fact his early roles in World War I and post 1918 films was as "the man you love to hate" - the perfect German militarist swine, who while raping some French woman would silence that squawking brat of hers by flinging it out the window. He carried this into his own films: His fake rake-Russian Prince in "Foolish Wives" (gleefully looking through his pocket mirror at a woman undressing in back of him), or his German noble in "Blind Husbands", who plans to cuckold a fellow traveler. He did these actions with commendable panache (imagine throwing a baby out the window with style!). So he could act. In fact, in his later career, given a great director (Jean Renoir, Billy Wilder) Von Stroheim was superb as an actor.So he returned to acting, and "The Great Gabbo" was the result. The criticisms on this thread are sensible. Anyone turning to "The Great Gabbo" to see the artistry of early talking picture musicals will run screaming from the room. To me the best songs are those dealing with Gabbo and his dummy "Otto". "Otto" singing any tune is a stunt, and one is willing to accept it as such. One is not listening to his tunes to recall them for later humming or singing purposes of one's own.Instead, the dominating force of "The Great Gabbo" is the masterful, high strung, egomaniac Von Stroheim. He does make himself the world's greatest ventriloquist, and rises to head a show. But the man has serious emotional flaws, and one senses they are not entirely his own fault. He cannot relate easily to people, even Betty Compson (who did care for him) because he can't trust them. They are flawed or they fail him at critical moments. One wonders what caused him to become this way, but it is a flaw of the script that it is never explained.That he dismissed Compson due to an error on her part is true, but he still carries a strong desire for her. But she's found another, and it sends him into a tailspin."The Great Gabbo" saved Von Stroheim. Aside from a talkie disaster he directed ("Walking Down Broadway", a.k.a. "Hello Sister!") he never directed any film again. He did have some affect in some of his B-features in the 1940s, such as "The Mask Of Dijon", where some critics have noted his touch in various scenes. But it wasn't directing. When he tried to suggest ideas for "Max Von Mayerling" in "Sunset Boulevard", Billy Wilder listened respectfully but did not use them.Instead he would be an actor for the rest of his career. And he would turn in "Von Rauffenstein" in "Le Grande Illusion", "Field Marshall Erwin Rommel" in "Five Graves To Cairo", and "Max" in "Sunset Boulevard". Not a bad final reckoning for the loss of a great directorial career. And it was "Gabbo" that started it.

Clunky solid gramophone sound and some sensational Ziegfeld stage numbers make this early talkie musical drama a real treat for viewers forgiving of 1929 movies. Vile schizophrenic ventriloquist brute, Von Stroheim, with his very creepy dummy (like the terrifying one in the DEAD OF NIGHT sequence with Michael Redgrave) seem somehow to be the toast of the stage. This 1929 showcase for both the technology of the day and the stage and screen stars rightly celebrated over the period are shown to be both fascinating and versatile as this film progresses. Other comments on this site will tell you the story and some criticize it's 1929 limits, but really THE GREAT GABBO is an excellent film of its day that rightly and clearly shows the force of Von Stroheim and the expert stage and screen dance entertainment popular in the 20s in the Ziegfeld sequences seemingly filmed right in front of a real stage. If you have seen THE BOYFRIEND the 1970 Ken Russell comedy you will get an idea of how fabulous THE GREAT GABBO must have looked in color. Most of the massive stage scenes are pale in my B/W copy and clearly are those sequences in Multicolour which the opening credits alert us to (be missing). Betty Boop sister Majorie Kane appears and most of the musical numbers are hilariously delightful, crowded with teens leaping about and bumping into each other in a great array of all sorts of fantasy costumes. The silliest and most enjoyable of which is a spider and fly number in which the above quote is hissed during a squabble in between verses. THE GREAT GABBO is a major find for students of 20s art deco, early talkie technology and very strong and effective acting. Von Stroheim must have been such a pain to Hollywood, a brute on screen and off. This film is full of wow! scenes. Highly recommended for anyone wanting further insight into the era. Other films worth seeing that add to the experience are GLORIFYING THE American GIRL, and THE 1929 SHOW OF SHOWS. The sound on my DVD copy is very good.

The Great Gabbo was made as a musical and altho some of the musical numbers and songs are not as good as those in other films of its time, they are interesting and enjoyable to see and hear, at least for some of us lovers of the popular music of the 1920s (and 30s).